The Trouble with Right
by starry19
Summary: 2x04 Tag- "He took just a moment to remember everything about this. Because it had the potential to be the last time. Her eyes were fathomless in the dim light, her skin luminous. She was heartbreakingly beautiful. Appropriate, since they were both heartbroken."


AN: So this is absolutely full of angst and I regret nothing. Nothing, I tell you! Dear lord, I love this show so very, very much.

*shameless begging* Drop me a line, let me know what you think.

 **The Trouble with Right**

He should not be doing this.

He knew that.

Knew he should be somewhere else. With someone else.

Also knew that there was no power in heaven or earth that could stop him.

Silently, as he had been trained, he pushed open the door to her room. The lights were off, and it took him a moment to adjust to the dark. When his eyes dilated, he could see her shadowy outline in bed, uncomfortable on her side, blankets drawn up to her shoulders.

Not thinking about what he was doing, he sat on the edge of the narrow mattress and carefully brushed her dark hair away from her temple.

She stirred at his touch, eyelashes fluttering.

She looked briefly surprised at his appearance. She shouldn't have been.

"I just wanted to make sure you were okay," he said, very quietly.

Now that was a stupid question. Of course she wasn't. Physically, emotionally, mentally. She was probably as far from _okay_ as it was possible to be. He had broken her heart. Her mother had tried to have her executed. And she'd been knifed by a goddamn Puritan.

"I'll live," she whispered back. She readjusted herself, then winced in pain as the stitches in her arm pulled.

"You should have told me you were going on a mission," he told her.

Her expression went carefully blank. "You had more important things to worry about."

His immediate reaction was to argue. No, he did _not_ have anything more important to worry about than whether she lived or died. But then, that wasn't the sort of answer he should give her. Now now. Especially when it shouldn't even be true. Unfortunately, love was not an emotion that could be turned off at will.

And so, as much as he loved Jessica, as beyond exultant as he was to see her, to touch her, he also needed to be in this room, with this woman, whose arms he had woken up in not two days before.

He shouldn't think about that. About 1941, and dark, liquid eyes, and kisses that had set him on fire. About moving inside of her.

Jesus.

Before he knew it, he was trailing a finger across her cheekbone, hoping his hands weren't shaking.

How was he going to do this?

This was hell.

He wanted to hold her, wanted to lay down next to her, pull her close and bury his nose in her hair.

In the same breath, he wanted to do the same with his wife. Who was trying very hard to divorce him.

This…this was going to require some soul searching that he wasn't sure he was capable of. He _had_ changed, as much as it sounded like a line. It wasn't. He was a different man, there was no getting around it. There was also no getting around the fact that he had _become_ a different man because of Lucy. _For_ Lucy.

He didn't know what Lucy saw in his face, but her brows furrowed as she looked up at him. Carefully, slowly, wincing occasionally, she sat up.

This was hell for her, too.

He had been it, been all she had. Betrayed by her family, a sister lost to time…he'd been the only thing she had.

It suddenly dawned on him that this was why Rittenhouse had brought his wife back. To take him away from Lucy. To leave her alone, vulnerable. To try and make her turn to them.

He didn't think he had ever been as ferociously angry as he was right now.

Unless it was when he had watched her walk away from him earlier, with Garcia Flynn's arm around her, that son of a bitch.

Not that he had the right to care anymore.

His heart had a different idea.

"What?" she asked, and he tried to figure out what his expression looked like. Murderous? Possibly.

Now was not the time. She didn't need to deal with anything else tonight.

"Just something I'm starting to think," he said, vaguely. "I'll tell you about it later."

The silence stretched between them. Two people that had a million things to say to each other, and all they came up with was…nothing.

"I'm sorry about your mom," he finally offered.

Her expression hardened. "Yeah. Me too."

He wondered again what she'd gone through in those missing six weeks. She'd never told him, despite asking more than once. He was under the impression that she wasn't interested in thinking about it ever again. Still - he _did_ want to know.

Absently, she rubbed at her arm, then made a face when her fingers trailed too closely to the freshly stitched skin. For all of her troubles, Lucy had gotten fourteen stitches, a bottle of painkillers, and enough antibiotics to choke a horse. God only knew what sort of germs were lurking in colonial New England.

He had been forced to lurk in the hallway, around the corner from their makeshift sickbay. Flynn was lounging in the doorway to the exam room, his arms negligently crossed. He did not like the idea of Flynn being the one to offer moral support to Lucy.

He also knew that he wouldn't be welcome in that room.

Still, it was an effort to stay put when he heard Lucy's soft exhalation of pain. It was obviously his overworked brain, but he imagined he could feel every one of her stitches as they went in.

Hell. It was utter hell.

He dealt with it the only way he thought would work.

He found his wife, tucked her into his arms. It reminded him that as bad as this all was, it could be worse. Both of the women he loved, with whom he could imagine the rest of his life, were safe. Alive. This had not been true twenty four hours ago.

No one had ever died of a broken heart, had they?

He had managed to wait an entire hour before he'd gone to find Lucy.

Garcia Flynn had passed him in the hall, going the other direction, and Wyatt was visited by the horrifying possibility that Flynn was just leaving Lucy.

It made sense - he had been very solicitous of her since their return, his normal biting sarcasm turned down unless he was trying to make her smile. With his own eyes, he had seen Lucy lean on him.

But the idea of Lucy turning to him, _into his arms_ , the way she had once turned into his, made spots appear in his vision. It felt like he had been punched in the stomach.

He was brought back to the here and now with Lucy's next words. "I suppose it's nice to know that my mom isn't terribly eager to kill me, even if Emma is."

His lips quirked. "I'm not sure Emma's ever met anyone she wasn't eager to kill."

Her mouth turned up a bit, and she held his eyes, the connection between them suddenly vibrant. He wanted to kiss her.

Instead, he curled his hand around the scratchy wool blanket.

"I hate this," he breathed, suddenly fierce.

He hadn't meant to say anything. Hadn't even wanted to have this conversation with her tonight.

"Well, I'm not the world's biggest fan of it either," she said back, and he knew with utter certainty that when he left this room, she would cry herself to sleep.

And he…he would likely spill a few tears in his wife's hair. In both happiness and heartbreak.

"But you're doing the right thing," she went on. He wondered if she was trying to convince herself. He hoped she was trying to convince him, too, because he needed it. "You are," she said, a little louder this time. "She's your wife." Her voice shook a little on the last word. "And you're going to try to make it work because you're a good man. I wouldn't love you half as much if you weren't."

His eyes closed. She had never said she loved him, not like this, not directly. The fact that it would be under these circumstances…

Without warning, he felt Lucy's hand on his face. He leaned into it, kissed her palm. Wiped absently at a tear.

"Just so you know," he said, voice hoarse, "yours is not the only heart that's broken."

"I know," she said, without missing a beat.

She _did_ know, just like she knew everything about him. She understood him in a few people ever could. Including Jessica.

But he was _not_ comparing them. It wasn't fair to either woman. They were entirely separate, entirely their own person. And they both knew an entirely different man.

He leaned over, pressed their foreheads together. "I love you," he whispered. "So goddamn much I think this might kill me."

Her next breath was a sob. "You have to do this," she said. "You have to try."

He nodded, another tear spilling down his cheek. "Yes."

She sniffled, and he felt her shoulders straighten. She was steeling herself. "So kiss me goodbye, and go back to her."

Oh, God. She would have to ask that.

As if he could refuse her anything.

He took just a moment to remember everything about this. Because it had the potential to be the last time. Her eyes were fathomless in the dim light, her skin luminous. She was heartbreakingly beautiful. Appropriate, since they were both heartbroken.

He kissed her, softly at first, both of their lips trembling. And then she sighed, and he let his control go. He put everything he felt for her into this kiss, just in case he wasn't ever going to do it again. Every ounce of love, of passion. Every night he had dreamed about her. Every time he had thought that she was the rest of his life.

And then he let her go.

They both knew this would never happen again.

Without another word, he stood and left.

The light in the hallway made him squint.

He felt hollow, almost ill.

The sound of footsteps alerted him to someone else's presence and he prayed it wasn't Flynn or Jessica. Not right now.

It was Rufus. He took in Wyatt's expression, then glanced to the door on the left. Of course, he knew whose room it was. Thankfully, he opted to reserve judgement.

"I know there were probably some things you two needed to say to each other in person," the other man said, "and that's fine. But before you do anything else," he went on, "you need to fix whatever the hell is going on with your face. Because if your wife sees you, she's going to know where you've been."

Wyatt was absolutely grateful for the other man. All he could do was nod.

Fix his face. Right.

He splashed cold water on his face. Briefly considered drowning himself in the sink.

The mirror told him Rufus was correct in his assessment. The same mirror he had punched in frustration. It seemed like a lifetime ago.

Trying to center himself, he twisted his wedding band.

He took a deep breath. Then another.

Giving up, he prayed that Jess had already turned the lights off.

She had.

He hesitated, unsure of his welcome.

But she didn't protest as he slid in beside him. A powerful shiver slipped down his spine. For the first time, after what he thought had been the last time _ever_ , his wife was asleep in his arms. No matter what happened, this time he would keep her safe.

He had begged for one last chance, and she had given it to him.

Jess shifted against his chest, and he abruptly bit the side of his hand to keep the tears at bay.

He just wished he knew what - or who - he was crying for.


End file.
